Winner
Entergy Corporation: Surviving Hurricane Katrina and Rita-the Communications Challenge of a Lifetime

A corporation's crisis response depends a great deal on its preparation. But Entergy Corporation was faced with a series of events that few could have anticipated – ones that directly impacted customers, employees, and shareholders alike. The company's success against the odds has earned it this year's Campaign of the Year award, and a place among the great crisis responses of all time.

Entergy was rocked by just about every conceivable kind of crisis between August 29 and October 12 of 2005: two hurricanes with huge restoration costs; the forced relocation of its headquarters and dislocation of 1,900 employees; the collapse of a subsidiary's revenue stream because of the New Orleans evacuation; and continuing blackouts. Hurricane Katrina created massive flooding and destruction in Entergy's hometown, Jefferson, LA, slamming through 37,000 square miles of Louisiana and Mississippi, where Entergy is the electric utility. At the peak, 1.1 million homes and businesses served by Entergy lost power.

Entergy mobilized 10,000 linemen and vegetation workers, and by late September, almost everyone had electricity restored, with the exception of homes and buildings that were inaccessible or too badly damaged. But Hurricane Rita soon followed, and hit another of Entergy's service territories, leaving up to 766,000 customers without power. Thirteen thousand workers were again mobilized to restore power. After days of rolling blackouts, more than 96% of those who lost power during Rita had it restored.

Entergy's corporate communications team faced several challenges, including executing its crisis management plan, and positively highlighting its progress under intense media scrutiny. It also had to win the sympathy and patience of customers frustrated after living days or weeks without electricity. The company's strategy followed its crisis communications plan for storms, which emphasizes communications speed and complete sharing of information with public officials, the media, and employees. The storm restoration process was opened up to reporters, letting them visit the emergency center to interview officials, interview linemen in the tent cities in the field, and take helicopter tours of heavily damaged or submerged areas.

A complete range of communications tools was used to try to tell the story, including news releases, daily media updates, press conferences, and periodic briefings for government officials. Internally, an informa- tion line was set up with recorded messages, newsletters, e-mails, IEStormNet website, and EntergyRadio.com. A video was also produced to rally employees.

One judge referred to Entergy's campaign as simply phenomenal, and that it exhibited outstanding execution and results in the most difficult of times. The company received widespread praise from the media and public officials.

Honorable Mention: Edelman and GE: GE”s Ecomagination—Green is Green

Winning over the typically cynical green community when you're a corporation the size of GE is no small feat, and for its success, GE and Edelman are a well-deserved Honorable Mention for PRWeek's Campaign of the Year. GE retained Edelman to develop and execute the global launch of Ecomagination, an initiative to aggressively bring to market new technologies that will help customers meet critical environmental challenges, in addition to improving the company's own environmental performance.

Through an address delivered by GE chairman and CEO Jeffrey R. Immelt on global environmental challenges, and the private sector's role in meeting these challenges, which were validated by Jonathan Lash, president of the World Resources Institute, quality media results ensued. Immediately following the launch, GE saw a 24% gain in profits from the previous year.

Finalists:

Edelman and GE: GE's Ecomagination—Green is Green

Edelman and Unilever-Dove: Dove Campaign for Real Beauty

Entergy Corporation: Surviving Hurricanes Katrina and Rita—the Communications Challenge of a Lifetime

Hill & Knowlton and Baidu.com: Baidu.com: Managing the Most Successful US IPO of the 21st Century

Ketchum, National Geographic, and IBM: Putting the Geographic Project On the Map